This is a compilation of 22 Palestinian prisoners' experiences in Israeli jails . 1,027 prisoners were released in 2011 as part of the exchange with Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit and 22 of them were interviewed by journalists. Their commentaries were translated by CPDS and edited.
The book is dedicated to Samer Issawi and all Palestinian prisoners, past, present and future, and was released on 17April 2013, in conjunction with Palestinian Prisoners' Day.

Tuesday, December 17, 2013

The Palestinian Prisoners Campaign aims to raise awareness for the plight of Palestinian prisoners and build solidarity for their struggle and work towards their freedom. The campaign was launched by Innovative Minds (inminds.com) and the Islamic Human Rights Commission (ihrc.org) on the occasion of Al Quds Day 2012 (on 17th August 2012), since then we have held actions every fortnight in support of Palestinian prisoners, if you can spare two hours twice a month then please join the campaign by coming to the next action.

Friday, December 13, 2013

Alaa Hammad, the Palestinian prisoner with Jordanian citizenship who has carried on an open-ended hunger strike since May 2, resumed his hunger strike on Sunday, December 9 after a brief suspension of his strike.

Hammad suspended his strike after the Israeli prison authorities agreed to facilitate family visits with his wife and children, and with his aunts and uncles. His aunts and uncles visited on Saturday, December 8 but no progress was made by the prison authorities to allow Hammad’s wife and children to visit him.

Therefore, Hammad, who has been denied family visits for 7 years, resumed his strike.

Thursday, December 12, 2013

Ahmed Kathrada is an anti-apartheid leader. He launched the Release Mandela Campaign and was imprisoned a year later, spending 26 years in apartheid jails. On October 27 on Robben Island, he launched the International Campaign to Free Marwan Barghouti and All Palestinian Prisoners.

Saturday, December 7, 2013

RAMALLAH (Ma'an) -- A Palestinian teenager was shot dead by Israeli soldiers in al-Jalazun refugee camp near Ramallah on Saturday.

Wajih Wajdi al-Ramahi, 14, was shot with live bullets in the back by an Israeli sniper in front of his school.

Al-Ramahi was taken to the hospital, and placed in the ICU until he died.

Locals told Ma'an that the area where al-Ramahi was shot had no clashes or any kind of rock-throwing incidents that might have provoked the killing.

The teenager father's said Israeli soldiers target youths and kill them, in order to amuse themselves.

He added that his son was shot by an Israeli soldier from a watchtower in Bet El with one bullet while he was walking near a school in the camp. He was hit directly in the back, and there was no clashes in the area, he added.

Al-Ramahi family said that their son was "executed" and "assassinated in cold blood," because he was shot in the middle of the day in the camp.

An Israeli spokeswoman said that they had opened an investigation into the matter, but had no further details.

More than 30 Palestinians have been killed so far in 2013 by Israeli forces.

Amnesty International's 2013 report on Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories highlighted the lack of accountability for Israeli soldiers' crimes against Palestinian civilians, pointing out that, "The authorities again failed to independently investigate killings of Palestinian civilians by Israeli soldiers in the West Bank and Gaza or to prosecute those responsible."

The internationally recognized Palestinian territories of which the West Bank and East Jerusalem form a part have been occupied by the Israeli military since 1967.

On 14th March 2013 in what appears to have been a car accident when a speeding illegal Israeli settler car crashed in to the back of an Israeli truck which had stopped to change a flat tire, on a illegal Jews-only road in the West Bank, resulted in four people being hurt. At the behest of angry settlers, the incident was later presented as an attack by Palestinian stone throwing youth.

The truck drivers earlier testimony that he had stopped due to a flat tire was replaced with the new reason being that he had seen stones by the road, and an accident that nobody saw suddenly became a terror attack with 61 witnesses including the police!

Over the next few days over 50 masked Israeli soldiers with attack dogs stormed the local village of Hares in the early hours of the morning and in waves of violent arrests kidnapped the children of the village. In total 19 children were taken to the infamous G4S secured children's dungeon at Al Jalame and locked up in solitary confinement for up to 2 weeks in filthy windowless 1m by 2m cells with no mattress. The children were violently tortured and sexual threats were made against the female members of their families in order to coerce confessions from the boys.

With the confessions and the new “eye-witness” statements, five of the Hares boys were charged with 25 counts of attempted murder each, even though there were only four people in the car. Apparently the military court had decided that 25 stones were thrown, each with an "intent to kill". The five boys - the "Hares Boys" - Ali Shamlawi, Mohammed Kleib, Mohammed Mehdi Suleiman, Tamer Souf, and Ammar Souf are currently locked up in another G4S secured facility - Megiddo prison where G4S provides the entire central command room.

With no evidence of a crime the military court keeps on postponing the hearing dates for the children. All the October and November military court dates were cancelled and new ones for December (starting next week) issued by the Israeli military to the families of the boys, meanwhile the boys remain caged now for nearly 9 months now. Not that evidence, or lack of it, has any bearing in an Israeli military court - a study conducted by the Israeli NGO 'No Legal Frontiers' over a 12 month period concluded that 100% of Palestinian children brought before the military court are convicted. If the five boys are convicted they will be locked up for over 25 years - five young lives ruined with no evidence of a crime let alone their guilt.

We are demanding the immediate and unconditional release of all the children and hold G4S complicit in Israel's crimes, particularly in the torture of Palestinian children.

Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Representatives from UFree Network and Yousef Al-Sedeeq institute for prisoners' protection (YAIPP) visited the family of Palestinian political prisoner Thamer Saba'neh, 35, who has been detained for more than 9 months in Israeli jails.

The visit came in light of the efforts in support of Palestinian activists, journalists and writers who are being targeted by Israeli occupation authority in an attempt to cover up its violations and crimes.

Thamer Saba’neh has served a total of 4 years in Israeli jails, where he first spent 40 days in 1998 and one year in 2000 while he was studying at al-Najah University. He was then arrested in 2006 and sentenced for 2 more years. His last arrest was on the 6th of March, 2013 that still continued without charge or trial.

Sab’aneh is well known by his support to the prisoners’ issue. He has written several articles and books in to highlight on the plight of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, led to his repeated arrests by Palestinian and Israeli authorities.
Read more here
UFree Network http://ufree-p.net/index.php/site/index/news/337/3

Friday, November 29, 2013

Mohammed as part of an arrest campaign against the children of Jerusalem.The Israeli occupation authorities have issued an arrest warrant for a four year-old Palestinian boy from Jerusalem, the Wadi Hilweh Information Centre has reported.

According to the Centre, the Israeli authorities raided the house of Zine al-Majid in old Jerusalem to arrest his four year-old son Mohammed as part of an arrest campaign against the children of Jerusalem.

"A large Israeli force raided our house at dawn on Thursday," said Mohammed's father. "They asked me the names of my children so I told them, whereupon the officer in charge told me that they have to arrest Mohammed." Even when he was told the boy's age, the officer was not convinced, said Abu Mohammed. "They told me to wake him up."

Once they had ascertained the boy's age, the arrest warrant was not actually served. "I told them that if they want to take him they would have to pack his milk and nappies!" said Abu Mohammed.

Nevertheless, the officer asked the boy a few questions about him and his friends because a child is accused of injuring an Israeli settler. He told the family that if it is discovered that he was the one who injured the settler, the 4 year-old would be taken to the police station to be questioned.

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

International and Palestinian human rights organizations have repeatedly called on Israel to end its excessive use of administrative detention.

“Israel has used its system of administrative detention — intended as an exceptional measure against people posing an extreme and imminent danger to security — to trample on the human rights of detainees for decades,” Ann Harrison, deputy director of Amnesty International, said in a 2012 statement. “It is a relic that should be put out to pasture.”

Friday, November 15, 2013

Alaa Hammad is a Palestinian father of six young children - 3 boys and 3 girls. They have not seen their father for 7 years as he rots in an Israeli dungeon after being severely tortured. As his act of resistance in demanding his freedom from an illegal occupation prison he started a hunger strike. 17th November will be his 200th day on hunger strike. Yet the BBC, which describes its mission as one to "inform" and "educate" and the news as "providing trusted World and UK news..", has refused to cover his story.

The search engine Google has indexed nearly 20 million articles from the BBC website yet it returns no results from the BBC for Alaa Hammad. Alaa Hammad has never once been mentioned by the BBC - those 20 million articles.. empty of any reference to the Palestinian hunger striker who is nearing death after nearly seven months without food.

Thursday, November 14, 2013

More than 300 persons came to the opening night of cartoonist Mohammad Saba’aneh’s Cell 28 exhibition at Ramallah’s Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center in the occupied West Bank on 6 November.

“I think it’s very important for Palestinian artists to talk about the Palestinian prisonersbecause it’s a very human issue,” Saba’aneh told The Electronic Intifada.

Originally from the village of Qabatiya near Jenin, 34-year-old Saba’aneh started drawing all the pictures on exhibition while he was in jail, completing them later.

He spent five months in prison after being arrested by Israeli occupation forces this past February. After two months of internment without charge, Israel charged him with drawing cartoons in a book they alleged had some association with Hamas.

The photographs on display deal solely with issues regarding Palestinian political prisoners. The themes include family visits, longing, loneliness, solitary confinement, prisoner transfers, education in prisons and healthcare in prisons.

Tuesday, November 5, 2013

UFree Network strongly condemned the Israeli occupation prison authorities of its medical negligence which resulted in the death of a Palestinian prisoner Hassan Al Torabi due to his illness with cancer, bringing the number of Palestinian prisoners died in Israeli jails to 205.

He was suffering from cancer but prior to his death, he said all he received from the prison authorities was paracetamol.

Thursday, October 31, 2013

It is not the leaking roofNor the singing mosquitoesIn the damp, wretched cell.It is not the clank of the keyAs the warder locks you in.It is not the measly rationsUnfit for man or beastNor yet the emptiness of dayDipping into the blankness of nightIt is notIt is notIt is not

Ramallah, Occupied West Bank - Twenty-six Palestinian prisoners, some held in Israeli jails for more than two decades, were released to their families in a "gesture of good faith" by Israel's government.

But critics say Tuesday's move should have been made decades ago under the Oslo Accords, and that the Palestinian Authority (PA) is milking the release for its own political gain.

Friday, October 25, 2013

Historical Event on Robben Island: Launch of the International Campaign for the freedom of Marwan Barghouthi and all Palestinian prisoners

On the 26th of October 2014, the 24th anniversary of his release from prison, anti-apartheid hero Ahmed Kathrada announced the launch of an International Campaign for the Freedom of Marwan Barghouthi and All Palestinian Political Prisoners. Kathrada was himself the initiator of the first Free Mandela Campaign after Nelson Mandela’s arrest in 1962. He was himself arrested a year later.Kathrada explained that an International High Level Committee which will champion the campaign for the freedom of Marwan and all Palestinian political prisoners will be announced at the campaign launch. This committee will include five Nobel Peace Prize Laureates. The call for the establishment of this committee was made by Ahmed Kathrada at an international “Freedom and Dignity” conference held in Palestine in April at the occasion of the 11th anniversary of Marwan's arrest.

Israel arrested 10,000 Palestinian children since 2000

Photo: EPA

The Palestinian Ministry of Detainees and Ex-detainees on Saturday said that the Israeli forces arrested 10,000 Palestinian since the outbreak of second Intifada in September 2000. The ministry said in a report on the occasion of the 13th anniversary of the second Intifada, also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada, that Israel is holding 250 children in prisons and detention camps in Israel and in the West Bank.

The Al-Aqsa Intifada broke out in Sept. 28, 2000, following a visit by Israel’s then-opposition leader Ariel Sharon to the Al Aqsa Mosque. The ministry said that 90 percent of the children were arrested from their homes during arrest campaigns that the Israeli army usually carries after midnight. The ministry added that the majority of them were forced to sign confessions written in Hebrew.

According to the ministry, “the Palestinian children are staying in very difficult circumstances in Israeli jails, are being violated during their arrests, during their interrogations and during their court proceedings.”

It added that the Israeli Prison Service “put them under psychological pressure and some jailers molested some of the children.” The ministry said that “holding Palestinian children in Israeli prisons violates the Article 76 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits an occupying power from transferring the population it is occupying to its own territory.” It added that “incarcerating minors, especially holding them without charge in administrative detention, violates the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.”

The official said that the Palestinian children still prosecuted at military courts that lack comprehensive fair trial and juvenile justice standards.

According to recent Palestinian statistics, Israel is holding 5,100 Palestinian prisoners in its in 17 prisons and detention camps in Israel and in the West Bank of whom 234 children, 15 females, 14 members of Palestine Legislative Council, 135 in administrative detention without trial and hundreds suffer from medical negligence.

"Palestinian human rights lawyer and activist Anas Barghouti was arrested by the Israeli army on 15 September. He was held without charge until 24 September when an Israeli military court presented him with charges related to his work and human rights activism. He is a prisoner of conscience and should be released immediately and unconditionally."

" Please write immediately in Hebrew, English, or your own language: Calling for the immediate and unconditional release of Anas Barghouti;Calling on Israel to put an immediate end to harassment of human rights defenders in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

Thursday, September 26, 2013

We support the campaign by Action for Palestinian Children to ensure the rights of Palestinian children are upheld in accordance with international human rights treaties and international law.

We call on Israel to implement these recommendations: 1) An end to Israel's nighttime raids and shackling of Palestinian children; 2) Audio-visual recordings of all interrogations; 3) Parents given the right to be present during questioning and the child's right to access to a lawyer before their interrogation respected; 4) An end to the transfer of children to prisons inside Israel in breach of article 76 of the fourth Geneva convention; 5) An end to the use of solitary confinement.

Sunday, September 22, 2013

Five youngsters: Mohammad Suleiman, Ammar Souf, Mohammed Kleib, Tamer Souf, and Ali Shamlawi, are being held in Israeli prison charged with 25 counts of attempted murder for alleged stone-throwing, with no evidence whatsoever. The boys have been labelled as “terrorists” before any objective investigation even took place. They’ve been condemned in the Israeli media as guilty even before they “confessed” to stone-throwing under torture. They’ve been denied any sort of justice in the Israeli military court system that convicts Palestinian children at a 99.7% rate, not unlike that of the world’s worst totalitarian regimes of the 20th century.#FreeHaresBoys Global solidarity from #France for 5 Palestinian children tortured & caged in #G4S secured Israeli dungeon

Thursday, September 19, 2013

Here is a link to an article on the Abu Jihad Museum for Prisoners which is in Abu Dis, and next to AlQuds University. The girl mentioned in here , Ghazali Sarahna is the daughter of Arina Sarahna whose story appears in the Prisoners' Diaries.http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-13989989

Wednesday, September 18, 2013

My name is Zeina. I'm 12 years old. I live in Ras al-Amud in Jerusalem. I was 15 days old when my dad was sent to prison, and he's serving a 20-year sentence. Find out more about Zeina's story in this short film produced by Defence for Children International Palestine.

It's worth mentioning that at the beginning of April, the 23-year-old Mohammed Al-Azzeh was seriously injured after he was shot by a rubber-coated steel bullet, fired by an Israeli soldier, which penetrated his cheek below the right eye and fractured his skull.

Israeli forces also raided the house of Mohammed's uncle, Nidal al-Azzeh, 52, and assaulted him along with two other family members. The soldiers searched the house and rummaged with its properties.

Nidal told PNN, "They were coming to take my nephew the photographer Mohammed Al-Azzeh, who was shot with a rubber-coated bullet and was treated in one of the hospitals for 20 days."

The Israeli army forces also raided the house of Mohammed's brother, and brutally beat him with their rifles. The soldiers also tried to assault his three daughters who were taking pictures for the soldiers during the assault. The soldiers were provoked and they confiscated the camera and destroyed it.

Nidal added that Mohammed was arrested few hours after the searching campaign was carried out by the Israeli forces at the camp, and that he was severely beaten on his cheek where the surgical operation took place. The soldiers sealed off the doors of Mohammed's family house, banning the family members from leaving their homes.

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

After 23 years in an Israeli prison, Halid Asakre, one of the Palestinian prisoners, returned to his homeland and was welcomed as a hero.

Israel has released 26 Palestinian prisoners as part of a deal ahead of the resumption of peace talks. Many prisoners, who were freed despite their sentences of life imprisonment, went back to their families who had lost all hope for their sons’ return. After 23 years in an Israeli prison, Halid Asakre, one of the Palestinian prisoners, returned to his homeland and was welcomed as a hero.

Friday, August 23, 2013

Written by Hamza Deirawiفي ظل التطورات المحيطة في الشرق الأوسط, تستغل إسرائيل الفرصة لتبقي الأسير#ضرار_أبوسيسي في العزل الانفرادي, وقد دخل اليوم يومه السابع في اضرابه المفتوح عن الطعام وأن اسرائيل تهدده من قبل محاميه أنها لن تخرجه من العزل الانفرادي الا ميتا...مع العلم أنه حاصل على شهادة دكتوراه في الهندسة الكهربائية وهو متزوج من امرأة أوكرانية مسلمة تعيش في غزة وهو أب لستة أبناء... ويذكر أن الموساد الاسرائيلي اختطفه من أوكرانيا بتاريخ 19/2/2011 ومنذ ذلك الحين لم يزره أهله وهو معزول عن بقية الأسرى في السجون الإسرائيلية...مع العلم أنه يعاني من أمراض ومشاكل صحية متعددة... مع العلم أنه الأسير الوحيد المتبقي في العزل الانفرادي...In light of the surrounding developments in the Middle East, Israel exploites the opportunity to keep the detainee #Derar_AbuSeci in solitary confinement. Today, he has entered his seventh day in open hunger strike and Israel is threatening him through his lawyers that he will not be released out from solitary confinement unless he is dead ...Knowing that he holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering, and he is married to a Ukrainian Muslim woman living in Gaza, and a father to six children ... It is noteworthy that the Israeli Mossad kidnapped him from Ukraine on 19/2/2011 and since then no one of his family have ever visited him, and he is isolated from the rest of the Palestinian detainees in Israeli jails ... with the knowledge that he is suffering from multiple diseases and health problems ...Just to reimind you that #Derar_AbuSeci is the only Palestinian detainee who is left isolated in sloitary confinement.

Wednesday, August 21, 2013

Failing to abide by regulations, Israeli soldiers inflict serious injuries to Palestinian children

Israeli forces are prohibited from firing rubber-coated metal bullets at women and children. Where firing rubber-coated metal bullets is allowed, police and military procedures state that they must only be fired from a distance of 50-60 meters (165 – 195 feet) and at the legs of people.The regulations prohibit directly targeting demonstrators with tear-gas canisters.

Despite these regulations, at least 24 children have been shot and injured by live ammunition, rubber-coated metal bullets or tear-gas canisters since January 2013, including two that died from their wounds, according to evidence collected by Defense for Children International Palestine (DCI-Palestine). While Israeli forces regulations allow the use of these weapons for crowd control in certain narrow circumstances, only a third of these cases involve children directly participating in demonstrations where clashes with Israeli forces later occurred.

Wednesday, August 14, 2013

This is in a special visit coordinated for a detainee in Israeli prisons to meet his sick paralyzed mother without a barrier. Such visits are rarely allowed for prisoners.

This man is the father of the young man whom I shared this photo from.

In the description he wrote, "My dear father, thoughts are flooded inside my mind while watching the released prisoners hugging their mothers and wiping their tears. I can almost see you in every one of them. I can smell you on their clothes. I can hear your voice in either their laughs or sighs. I miss you my dad and I am longing for your warm lap. Your freedom will mean life to me. You will restore it one day, God willing!

I

In the Prisoners' Diaries, Abdulrahman Shehab describes his father's reaction when the jailer opened the door to allow him and the family to take a family photo with his incarcerated son, after 17 years of only communicating through a glass barrier. He was so overwhelmed he had almost fainted.

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

UFree Network to defend the rights of Palestinian political prisoners and detainees welcomed the release of a number of Palestinian prisoners. The network considered the step as late, long overdue that is used to cover up its the Israeli ugly image perceived worldwide through showing “real” intention of peace seeking.

Monday, August 12, 2013

From Electronic Intifada, an article by Ali Abunimah referring to the impending release of long term prisoners by the israelis.

"....But what’s most striking – and unremarked – about all this is that Israelis are, by and large, the only ones who have the opportunity to bewail the release of prisoners held for decades for killing their loved ones as some sort of great sacrifice and injustice.

The examples of crimes where there has been a total absence of accountability and justice are simply too numerous to list, but they include the 1982 Sabra and Shatila massacres of thousands of Palestinians during the Israeli occupation of Lebanon, and more recently more than 1,400 Palestinians killed in Gaza in 2008-2009 duringOperation Cast Lead.

Sunday, August 11, 2013

Israel released Omar Barghouti, the currently longest-serving Palestinian administrative detainee on Wednesday, August 7, after 34 months of imprisonment without charges or trial.

Barghouti, age 60, is from the town of Kobar near Ramallah in the occupied West Bank.

The Ahrar Center for Prisoners’ Studies and Human Rights notes that Barghouti had spent nearly 26 years of his life in Israeli prisons in repeated arrests.

Omar Barghouti’s brother is the former longest-serving Palestinian prisoner, Nael Barghouti, who spent 34 years in occupation jails. Omar is the father of four children; his son Asim is currently serving an 11-year sentence in prison.

Nael Barghouti had related his experience of imprisonment in The Prisoners' Diaries.

Jordanian prisoners suspend hunger strike following agreement on family visits after 100 days

The Palestinian prisoners holding Jordanian citizenship have suspended their hunger strike following concessions from the Israeli prison authorities to allow them regular family visits from their family members in Jordan. This was reported in a press conference held in Amman by family members of the prisoners on August 11, 2013.

The five Jordanian hunger strikers are Abdullah Barghouthi, Mohammad Rimawi, Muneer Mar’i, Hamza Othman al-Dabbas and Alaa Hammad. They have been striking since May 2, 2013, for 100 days.

The first visit will take place on August 27, and will be for four hours, without glass or bars between the prisoners and their family members. After this, the visits will be available on a monthly basis for two family members per prisoner. An agreement has been signed to this effect, which will also apply to fellow Palestinian prisoner Ibrahim Hamed, whose wife is in Jordan. Barghouthi had not seen his family for 13 years; Rimawi has been denied family visits for 5 years.

There are reports that Alaa Hammad is still on open hunger strike and has not suspended his strike as part of this agreement.

Monday, August 5, 2013

In the letter by social activist Hassan Karajah, which was posted earlier, he refers to the land of the sad orange.

Ghassan Kanafani was born in Akka Palestine in 1936 and died, as a result of an
Israeli bomb planted to his car on 8th July 1972. His Danish wife Annie, described the
event saying: “…We used to go shopping together every Saturday morning, on that
day he accompanied his niece Lamees. A few minutes after they left, I heard the sound
of a huge explosion. I ran but only saw remanence of our exploded small car. Lamees
was a few meters away from the spot, but I could not find Ghassan. I hoped to find
him injured, but I only found his left leg. I was devastated, and our son Fayez, started
knocking his head against the wall. Little layla was crying: Baba…Baba…I gathered
his remains, the Beiruti escorted him to his last resting place at the Shuhada
Cemetery where he was buried next to Lamees who loved him and died with him“

Kanafani is a prominent literary figure in the Arabic Literature and worldwide. His
works were translated to many different languages. During his short life he enriched
the Arabic library by with valuable collection of publications, varying from novel to
short story to literary researches and political essays. “The Land of the Sad Orange”
is one of his early stories that depicts the influence of the deportation on the
Palestinians when the Israeli troops took over their country in 1948.

Hassan Karajah is a Palestinian youth activist, the Youth Coordinator of the Grassroots Campaign to Stop the Wall, and a human rights defender with a long record of organizing and public activism with the Partnership for Development Project, an umbrella group for Tamer Institution, Ma’an Development Centre and Bissan Centre for Research and Development, and the Arab Thought Forum. He gave an interview before his detention in which he saluted political prisoners’ struggle, saying that “their struggle has given us a model of steadfastness and the certainty that if we stand up united, we can win, step by step, our freedom and national self-determination.”

Imprisoned after a late-night raid on his home in January 2013, he is nowfaced with political charges (of membership in a prohibited organization, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and connections with the Lebanese resistance) based on event attendance and travel to Lebanon.

He worked closely with international solidarity activists as part of Stop the Wall, and called for people of the world to act for Palestine: ”We do expect a lot from the people around the world. We know that many understand and support our struggle. We need to work closer together and ensure that our actions are better coordinated and we grow stronger and more effective in pressuring companies and governments around the world to stop their complicit silence and their support to Israel, whether at an economic, political or cultural level.” On July 30, Addameer released his letter, below, addressed to the free world (here, in Arabic):

To all of my friends everywhere in the world….to each person in solidarity… to all who care about the cause of prisoners…to all who believe in the justice of our cause, Palestine, who cherish peace, love, the steadfastness of the prisoners, and the sweet scent of freedom, I say:

“The wheat, when it is spread on the land, some will be crushed by feet and die, some will be eaten by birds, and some makes it to the earth, and then rain comes, and with the first appearance of the sun, the wheat comes as a positive omen of the continuation of life.”

Dear all, know that I miss you and I’m eager to see you all. What prevents me from this is the Zionist occupation’s detention, whi

ch it uses against me as it did against the sons and daughters of our people 65 years ago. However, if this is for the freedom of Palestine, our land and our rights, I am prepared to bear this, and I am sure that you are willing to continue in the same way.

In these moments, when I am writing to you and imagine all of your souls around me as my soul greets you, I do not exclude any of you. I cannot say each of your names for one reason – we have a shortage of stationery in the prisons, such as pens and paper. By these shortages, the prison administration intends to besiege the prisoners and deprive us of education. You know that this is a drop in the sea in terms of the practices of oppressing us and attempting to break our steadfastness – which they will never do. I wrote to you special notes in notebooks, but those are confiscated by the prison administration before they reach you, so I send you my smile each day with the sun to welcome it.

If you ask me, I am fine and healthy, despite the denial of proper treatment and medical negligence practiced against all prisoners without exception. But morally, my morale soars above the wind, for which there is one main reason: you have always stood beside me.

I have not forgotten all of my friends everywhere, although I do not see you at this time, but your images have not been erased from my mind. Your principles will not be separated from mine, our convictions are united, and what you believe is what I believe. The walls of the prison have not changed this; they did not and will not be able to stop me from loving you more. I still meet with you in the land of sad oranges*; Um Sa’ad is still our mother**; and I am sure that you will still hear banging on the walls of the tank*** that will not cease until all of the refugees return to their homes, and the homes of their grandfathers. We will not stop pounding on the walls of the tank and other walls – until every friend will be able to visit Palestine, its land, water, air and the entire national soil.

This period will not last long. We will keep this belief, because belief generates hope, hope generates work, and work is the road to freedom – the freedom that has no equivalent but itself.**** This work must be collective, and no matter how small, will have an impact. Small steps, once they are together, become an army, and a noble morning. We have a noble army, an army of an idea, the army that trusts its people as much as I trust in our people and their limitless potential.

We come from inside our cells and the prison walls to the world through books. We read, and become part of the characters that tell those stories and novels, and they make doors that take us out of the darkness of the prison. This is why the occupation attempts, by various practices, means and procedures, to prevent books from being introduced to the prisoners.

When I received the news that many of my ideas and dreams have become reality because you have done the work, I am certain that I have not yet been imprisoned. I see the continuation of my work in your existence. I saw my freedom in your eyes. I heard my voice in yours. They have imprisoned the body, but they could not jail the idea and will not be able to do so.

Here, we draw our energy to continue from you. We, the newly detained prisoners, our hearts are full of happiness when, while being transported from prisons to court, we meet prisoners we have heard about for decades, whose photos and posters we have carried in the streets, prisoners from whom we learned our readiness to struggle since childhood.

In conclusion, I affirm to you that they will never be able to bring about our end. We are stronger than they are able to weaken us. We are higher than they are able to lower us. We are deeper than they are able to reach us. We continue.

I say to you at the end of this message – I will see you soon. I will come out as you have known me and better, and I will greet you with the single word, “Freedom.”

Thursday, August 1, 2013

Mahmoud Sarsak was arrested as he was leaving Gaza to join the national football team . He spent 3 years in an Israeli prison without charge, tortured in order to extract a confession, and was only released after he went on a hunger strike which created uproar throughout the world.

The Israel Defense Forces' detention of a five-year-old Palestinian boy in Hebron earlier this month was a legitimate step in order to “thwart the threat posed by the activities of a minor,” the IDF’s legal adviser in the West Bank has ruled.

Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Occupied Ramallah, 31 July 3013 - Following the growing international discourse surrounding hunger strikes and force-feeding of Palestinians in Israeli prisons, detainees in the United States Guantanamo Bay detention camp and California prisons, we the undersigned Palestinian and Israeli civil society organizations, express our solidarity with hunger striking prisoners and detainees across the globe and express our opposition to the suppression of legitimate protests through severe punitive measures and force feeding.

Sunday, July 28, 2013

One of the cruellest things about the Zionist occupation of Palestine is the imprisonment and torture of children.

"The hardest memory is the sentence pronounced by a soldier before Ali was handcuffed and brought to an unspecified destination: “Kiss goodbye to your mother, because you might not see her again”. Ali’s mother sobs as she repeats these words, and then adds: “At first I thought he said this just to scare us, but now I see that he really meant that”. If the prosecution succeeds in sentencing the boys to 25 years of prison, Ali might see his family again until he is 41 years old."

The charge of 25 counts of attempted murder is based on each stone found on the road ! The boys say they were not even there at the time of the car crash , and the truck driver said he had stopped due to a flat tyre , not to stones being thrown.

Read more of the incredible way Israel persecutes young palestinians here

Very touching words written by the hero Walid Daqqa, one of the most intellectual Palestinian authors in Israeli prisons who forms a source of inspiration of many youth inside and outside jail, including me. He wrote this arabic piece that I am sharing below today as he starts his 28th year in imprisonment. The following is my translation of his moving piece. Please share to let the word know that Walid Daqqa isn't just a number, but he's a beautiful soul who can teach the whole world humanity.

"Today I acknowledge at the 28th anniversary of my detention, that my heart has never known hatred, nor I have mastered the toughness and the crudeness that prison life imposes on one.

I further admit that I still rejoice and feel as happy as a kid for the simplest things, and I feel filled with joy for receiving a little compliment or hearing a nice word.

I admit that my heart leaps up for glancing a flower, the sea, or any scene of nature on TV. I admit that I am happy despite everything, and I don't miss any of life luxuries.

I only miss two scenes: the children and the workers. I miss those glimpses of children gushing out of all alleys of the village, heading to their schools in the morning, and the scene of workers as they are coming from all neighborhood very early in a foggy cold morning, enthusiastic while they head to the city centre, getting ready to travel to their work places.

I admit all these sentiments and all this love was never to remain without the love of my mother Farida, my wife Sanaa, my brother Hussny, and the support of all of my family, friends, and beloved ones to me. For them I admit that I am still a human embracing the love in my heart and holding it as it was a flamed stone. I promise you I will remain steadfast with this love. I will keep loving you dearly as my love is my only humble victory against my jailer."

Under the Zionist occupation, Palestinian children do not have any rights , as can be seen from the first hand testimony of these 13 year old boys

"Inside the jeep, the soldiers hit Subuh on the head, dropped him and his friend Ahmad at al-Jalameh crossing where there was a wide field and asked them to walk into the mid of the field ordering them to undress completely except for underwear.“The soldiers approached us and two of them caught me and dragged me to the crossing while I was undressed and barefooted, as my clothes were left behind in the field” said Subhi.They made both of them sit on at the crossing before they had cuffed and blindfolded them.“The soldier tied the cuffs strongly around my hands in a very painful way which caused me hurts and marks until today” he added."

.........

"“Afterwards, he wrote down, in Hebrew, on a piece of paper for half an hour and asked me to sign it, but I refused to sign on something I did not know” Subuh said. “He told me “sign it in order to make your father come and release you”, but I refused, then, he took a stick of iron and hit me on the back with it and said “if you do not sign, we will bring your mother and brothers to investigate them here” I feared his threat and signed it” child Subuh said. "

Thursday, July 25, 2013

From the website of the Islamic Human Rights Commission, who interviewed me last week in London about The Prisoners' Diaries. IHRC are the UK publishers of the book, and have made the book available on Amazon UK and the Book Depository.

Mother of detainee Mohammad Odeh, from Jerusalem, stated that the soldiers demanded dozens of women, mothers, wives and sisters of the detainees to be strip-searched, but they refused and were forced back home.

Sunday, July 21, 2013

A protest is today being held outside the headquarters of mega security corporation G4S in support of 5 children from the village of Hares who have been falsely arrested, tortured, kept in solitary confinement and forced to give false confessions, all of which has been facilitated by G4S.

A United Nations committee focused on youth rights accused Israel Thursday of failing to stop the mistreatment of Palestinian children in military and police custody.

The group's report accuses Israeli forces of using Palestinian children as human shields, and alleges that detained children in some cases face torture, solitary confinement and threats of sexual assault.

Assembled by the U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child, the 21-page document comes three months after a UNICEF paper criticized the "systematic and institutionalized" mistreatment of Palestinian children detained by the Israeli military

Imagine the story of a man waiting eagerly and anxiously for the arrival of his first born child, and as he waits, he is unjustly detained and sentenced to twenty-seven years behind bars. His wife gives birth to their child while he is in prison and the child grows up without ever having set eyes on their father. However, after eleven years, the tragedy reaches its climax; while listening to a radio broadcast in prison, the man hears news of the death of his only son who had been waiting on pins and needles for his father's embrace...

Thursday, June 27, 2013

On Sunday 30th June it will be the 60th day that 5 Palestinian political prisoners with Jordanian citizenship have been on hunger strike in Israeli occupation jails. The prisoners families are asking for the immediate release of all Palestinian political prisoners, and in the very least Israel be made to abide by its side of the shameful Wadi Araba normalisation agreement which King Hussein signed with Israel in 1994, under which Jordanian prisoners in Israeli jails should be transferred to Jordan to serve their sentences where at least the families of the prisoners can visit - something Israel is not permitting. The prisoners are also demanding Israel disclose the where abouts of 20 Jordanian prisoners which are missing, and to return the bodies of the prisoners who have died in Israel custody, which Israel has dumped in numbered graves, back to their families.

Wednesday, June 26, 2013

A nine-year-old boy Tariq Assakani passed away in a road accident in Gaza today. Tariq is the only child of the Palestinian prisoner Ahmad Assakani who is serving a 27 year sentence in Israeli jails.

The bus Tariq was traveling in was heading for a summer camp. It included thirty prisoners’ children. All have been injured and five are in a critical condition. All of the children have not seen their fathers for years.

26 June 2013, Occupied Ramallah – In light of the commemoration of the International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, the case of the almost 5,000 Palestinian political prisoners held in Israeli prisons is of particular importance and poignancy.

Since 1967, 73 Palestinian detainees have died from torture at the hands of their Israeli interrogators.

Abu Sisi, the deputy engineer of Gaza’s only power plant, was abducted in Ukraine, the country of his wife’s birth, in early 2011. He has been held in an Israeli prison since then. Throughout that time, his wife Veronika has only been able to have three telephone chats with him.

“The last call, which took ten minutes, was in January 2012,” she said. “When my mother died back in Ukraine, they refused to let us have a phone conversation.”

Sunday, June 23, 2013

Today, 23 June 1013, the head of Addameer's documentation unit, Mrs. Ehteram Ghazawneh, will give testimony to the United Nations Special Committee to investigate Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian people and other Arabs of the territories occupied since 1967. The Special Committee is meeting in Jordan and Mrs. Ghazawneh will detail the on-going violations against the almost 5,000 Palestinian political prisoners currently being held by Israel. Violations to be raised include medical neglect, torture, administrative detention, prison conditions, violations against children, as well as the on-going hunger strikes.

On 20 May, Obeida Shamali visited his father, Ahmad Abd Alraheem Shamali, in Israel’sNafha prison. It was the first time they had seen each other since Israeli forces captured Ahmad in August 2008.

“I was very happy,” the seven-year-old said. He was sitting under a picture of his father in his family’s house in Gaza City’s al-Shajaiyeh neighborhood. “Before it, I imagined how his face would look when I met him, because I hadn’t seen him for such a long time.”

Thursday, June 6, 2013

In the Prisoners' Diaries, a recurring complaint by the freed prisoners was about how they were denied medical treatment. Ibrahim Joundia states "..the prison clinic is not there to decrease pain, but to increase it." Akram Mansour endured piercing headaches for several years but received no treatment, until he went on hunger strike.

Lina al-Jarbouni suffers severe pain in her gallbladder and doctors have said she needs surgery urgently, said Ahmad al-Bitawi of the Solidarity Foundation for Human Rights.

Al-Bitawi, who researches prisoner affairs, said the prison administration has repeatedly refused requests to allow al-Jarbouni to undergo surgery.

Al-Bitawi visited al-Jarbouni in Hasharon prison and said she was unable to eat or sleep and is only being given pain killers. She has lost weight and suffers a constant headache, he said in a statement.

Meanwhile, prisoner Muna Qadan told her lawyer Muhamad al-Abed that all female detainees would go on hunger strike if Israel continued to deny medical treatment to al-Jarbouni.

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

Official statistics from the Ministry of Information in Ramallah have revealed that 1,518 Palestinian children were killed by Israel's occupation forces from the outbreak of the second Intifada in September 2000 up to April 2013. That's the equivalent of one Palestinian child killed by Israel every 3 days for almost 13 years. The ministry added that the number of children injured by the Israelis since the start of the Second Intifada against Israel's occupation has now reached 6,000.

"The International Day for the Protection of Children is on June 1," said a spokesman, "but Palestinian children are still subject to attacks by the Israelis and Jewish settlers on an almost daily basis."

Noting that 2012 saw an unprecedented rise in the number of children arrested by Israeli forces, the report pointed out that 9,000 Palestinians under 18 years old have been arrested since the end of September 2000. Almost half of the Palestinian population is under 18. Almost two hundred and fifty Palestinian minors are being held in prison by Israel; 47 of them are children under 16 years of age.

Friday, May 31, 2013

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama – Terry Holdbrooks Jr., 29, wears the beard of a bald Amish guy, the tattoos of a punk kid, and the twitchy alertness of a military policeman. Take him to a restaurant, and he’ll choose the chair with its back against the wall. Take his photo, and he'll prefer to look away from the camera.Part of that wariness Holdbrooks learned while guarding detainees from 2003 to 2004 at Guantanamo Bay, the U.S. holding tank for military prisoners on the southeastern point of Cuba. And part of that wariness he developed after he converted to Islam while stationed at Guantanamo after months of midnight conversations with the Muslim detainees – a conversion that prompted several of his fellow soldiers to try several times to talk some “sense” into him so he wouldn’t “go over to the enemy,” as they put it.

Thursday, May 30, 2013

This comes from a report in the Guardian newspaper of Jan 2012, and I believe nothing has changed.

"The room is barely wider than the thin, dirty mattress that covers the floor. Behind a low concrete wall is a squat toilet, the stench from which has no escape in the windowless room. The rough concrete walls deter idle leaning; the constant overhead light inhibits sleep. The delivery of food through a low slit in the door is the only way of marking time, dividing day from night.

This is Cell 36, deep within Al Jalame prison in northern Israel. It is one of a handful of cells where Palestinian children are locked in solitary confinement for days or even weeks. One 16-year-old claimed that he had been kept in Cell 36 for 65 days.

The only escape is to the interrogation room where children are shackled, by hands and feet, to a chair while being questioned, sometimes for hours.

When Israel kills a Palestinian, it not only abruptly ends his or her life, it leaves deep wounds with the family that time cannot heal. And it pushes the family to threaten Israel demographically by having one more child — perhaps even more.

The years of the first and second Palestinian intifadas — not to mention the preceding years of Naksa (setback) in 1967 and Nakba (catastrophe) in 1948 — witnessed the birth of thousands of children who were named after Palestinians shot dead by Israel.

Israel’s attempts to reduce Palestinians’ numbers have never proven successful. The possibility that the “demographic time-bomb” will explode only becomes increasingly likely as Israel kills more Palestinians.

Palestinian women, such as my mother who gave birth to 13 children (excluding two who died before birth), have kept on delivering more children and naming them after those who died. My brother Omar is no exception.

As part of the continuous arrest campaign by the Israeli occupation forces , they besieged the house of former political prisoner Hashem AbuZayyad in Bethany (Eizareya) east Jerusalem, yesterday after midnight, with the intention of arresting his sons Jameel, 25, and Hamzah 19.

IDF soldiers violently raided the AbuZayyad house, shouting and horrifying the rest of the family members. They also performed a brutal inspection of the house and destroyed the family's personal belongings.

As both Jameel and Hamzah were not at home, the Israeli occupation savagely arrested the father Hashem AbuZayyad, 55, barely allowing him to collect his medicine before leaving, where he was taken to Ma'ale Adumim police center at 2 am this morning. The Israeli occupation authorities questioned him all night, and eventually released him this morning at 8 am after forcing him to sign a commitment to make his sons Jameel and Hamzah surrender to the occupation authorities. Accordingly, both did so at 9 am, although no charges were filed against them. The mother of Jameel and Hamza had an operation and is still recovering. In view of what happened to her family, she got a nervous breakdown and was sent to hospital in an ambulance. Despite her broken heart, she is so proud of her young men who are sacrificing their lives for their beloved homeland, noting this has been happening in every Palestinian family's house for 65 years. Israeli occupation's Humiliation, racism, and oppression persist against the Palestinian people, while the whole world is just watching.

Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Edited and published during the Palestinian prisoners' hunger strike, The Prisoners' Diaries is a distressing fragment of testimonies from Palestinians whose deterioration in Israeli jails has become a fact of life, rather than a blatant violation of human rights. The resilience against the occupation and a lack of global outrage against torture and apartheid practices resonated with irregular frequencies within the international community, as leaders relegate human rights to the vestiges of redundant diplomacy.

Sunday, May 19, 2013

The death of Mahmoud Da'ajna's mother who had not seen him for 21 years reflects the inhumanity of the Israeli prison system. Next week, another Palestinian prisoner Ahmad Sa'adat , aged 60 and sentenced to 30 years in Jail, will go to court to demand that his granddaughter be allowed to visit him.

In The Prisoners' Dairies, both Alaa Albazyan and Nael Albarghouti speak about the pain of learning their mothers had passed away when they were incarcerated.

A Palestinian Political Prisoner's mother dies - Jerusalem .

19 \ 5 \ 2013

RamallahSarah Nofal Da'ajna, the mother of the prisoner Mahmoud Da'ajna dies at the age of 85 years. Prisoners' club confirmed in a statement issued earlier that Daajna, who was detained 21 years ago, didn't see his mother since 21 years as the occupation authorities had not allowed his mother to visit him, noting that she had very critical health conditions which lasted during her son's arrest.

It is noteworthy that Daajna, who is 63 years old, is one of the oldest prisoners in Israeli jails, and is now detained in Gilboa Prison.

Prisoners club, human rights activists and all the Palestinian people extend to Daajna family deepest and most sincere condolences on their loss

(This article comes from the posting on the Free Samer Issawi campaign Facebook page which is run by Malaka Mohamed in Gaza.)

Thursday, May 16, 2013

This is a very disturbing report by photojournalist Samar Hazboun which appeared in 972mag. Its difficult to imagine how human rights violations like these can continue for years without protest from the rest of the world. It is up to us who know, who have to do something about this.

Detained: Testimonies from Palestinian Children Imprisoned by Israel’ uncovers one of the most painful experiences that Palestinian children endure in the ongoing Israeli occupation. Through interviews with ex-detainees and mothers of minors presently in detention, the project documents their stories and aims to lend a voice to those who are silenced from fear of negative repercussions.

“Courtroom number 2. The military court for Palestinian children. Every Monday. On the podium, Judge Sharon Rivlin Ahai. From 9 a.m. until 6 p.m. Boy follows boy. One child and then another child. Wearing brown prison garb. Chained feet. Shackled hands, one hand shackled to that of another boy. Some of them are so small that their feet wave in the air when they are seated on the bench.”

Wednesday, May 15, 2013

This article from The Palestine Chronicle was written by Yousef Aljamal from CPDS, who , together with Raed Qaddura, had translated the interviews featured in The Prisoners"Diaries.

"Palestinians in Palestine and in the Diaspora mark the annual anniversary of the Catastrophe, also known as the Nakba, on May 15th every year as a result of the massive ethnic cleansing carried out by Zionists gangs in 1947-1948 which resulted in the displacement of almost 750,000 Palestinians from their villages and cities."

Monday, May 6, 2013

How sad that children in Gaza who had fathers in Israeli prisons had not been able to see them since 2006.

GAZA, May 6 — Israel allowed Gaza children under eight-year-old to visit their jailed fathers for the first time in over six years, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Monday.

Seven children traveled Monday to Israel with their mothers or grandparents to see their fathers in prison, according to Nasser Al-Najjar, spokesperson for the ICRC.

The ICRC welcomed the Israeli decision, Al-Najjar said, hoping Israel would remove other restrictions to the prisoners’ family members.

Israel suspended all visits to Gaza prisoners when Islamic Hamas movement, which controls Gaza, captured an Israeli soldier in a cross-border raid in 2006, who was then swapped for more than 1,000 prisoners in 2010.

Last year, Israel resumed family visits to Gaza after a hunger strike of the detainees, but the visits were restricted only to the wives and parents of the inmates.

Ramallah, 17 April 2013—Israeli authorities held at least seven Palestinian youths, aged 16 to 17, in solitary confinement for periods reaching up to 21 days so far this year, based on DCI-Palestine's research.

The Prisoners' Diaries Arabic version book

In Gaza it will be available for sale at the Hashim Yeop Sani library at the Centre for Political and Development Studies , Nema'a Tower, Gaza City. Sale proceeds will be used to fund library activities to encourage citizen journalism.

Book reviews

" This book is so valuable as it combines the witnessing by prisoners with just enough information about the magnitude of the Israeli prison system to give readers a true understanding of this most agonizing dimension of the Palestinian ordeal.”(..More)

− Richard Falk,Albert G. Milbank Professor of International Law Emeritus, Princeton University and UN Special Rapporteur for occupied Palestinian Territories

"While activists and supporters of the Palestinian cause will undoubtedly be outraged by the atrocities narrated in this book, it would serve as an incentive for international leaders and organisations clamouring for human rights to reconsider and reconcile themselves with the universality of such themes."-- Ramona Wadi, Middle East Monitor. (..More)

“ I defy you to read these stories and not weep for Jews and Palestinians. Now dry your eyes and work for justice, peace and reconciliation.”